Following with the
analysis using networks of the game of several national teams (which can be seen in Spanish in
this history and
this one, here comes the Netherlands, which is usually one of the favorites, but usually also underperforms. No wonder. Looks at this graph, computed from passes during the last match agains Latvia. As in the previous post, a link indicates a pass.
(data can be downloaded from
here).
A subtle issue here, that can't be seen clearly, is that just 7 of the 12 players that played in this match (that Netherlands won agains Latvia) are
origin of passes. Five of them never pass to other players; either they miss a pass, or shoot, or they just loose the ball. Here's the betweenness, and normalized betweennes for each player:
1 2
Betweenness nBetweenness
------------ ------------
6 Phillip_COCU 10.217 2.211
3 Jaap_STAM 4.217 0.913
8 Edgar_DAVIDS 2.600 0.563
5 Giovanni_VAN_BRONCKHORST 2.567 0.556
7 Andy_VAN_DER_MEYDE 1.850 0.400
1 Edwin_VAN_DER_SAR 0.950 0.206
10 Ruud_VAN_NISTELROOIJ 0.600 0.130
The rest is 0. Nil. Nothing. A team of 12 with just 7 passing the ball. Even so, Cocu, a midfielder, has the highest centrality, appearing as the game organizer, followed by
Stam, a defender; I tend to think that is good, but it would be better if their betweennes was closer.
However, they will play at Sweden first, and I will have a look at them soon.
